Today’s socio-economic challenges aren’t new. In the centuries after the retreat of the Roman state people with different backgrounds and with different ways of life somehow managed to build and maintain a complex economic system in northern Gaul that would produce the ruling dynasties of Europe. By…

The Persian Empire (539-330 BCE) was the first world empire in history. At its height, it united a territory stretching from present-day India to Libya - and it would take 2,000 years before significantly larger empires emerged in early modern Eurasia. This territorial sweep is both a source of fascination…

The project explores the impact of the clash between defenders of a rules-based order and international law on global governance and the future of legal systems.

Is the legitimacy of law and governance of multilevel jurisdictions diminishing? What is the significance of (diminishing) legitimacy for the effectiveness of law? These kinds of questions about the legitimacy of the supranational formation of law, its application, and the policy and governance based…

This collection of essays explores processes of innovation in Greco-Roman technology and science.

What was the stringed instrument known in medieval and early Renaissance Italy as “cetra”?

Until the 1990s, the only known planets were those in our Solar System. Three decades later, several thousand exoplanets have been discovered orbiting stars other than the Sun, and substantial efforts have been made to explore these strange new worlds through spectroscopic analyses of their atmosphe…

Until recently, the role of external information processing in intelligence has rarely been investigated quantitatively or experimentally. A group of researchers from Erasmus University Rotterdam, Leiden University, GGZ Rivierduinen, and University of Edinburgh measured in a new way how and when people…

Sarah Giest and Annemarie Samuels, both Assistant Professors at Leiden University, researched the quality and coverage of the data being collected for policiymakers to be used, specifically pertaining to minority groups.

Does hegemony—legitimated rule by dominant power—have a role in ordering world politics of the twenty-first century? If so, what form does that hegemony take: does it lie with a leading state or with some other force? How does contemporary world hegemony operate: what tools does it use and what outcomes…

International trade has played a major role in defining the modern global economy. Trade, however, entangles the environmental pressures of economic sectors, giving the illusion of environmental improvements, while the opposite may be occurring.

What was the stringed instrument known in medieval and early Renaissance Italy as “cetra”?

The Faculty of Archaeology's own home-grown journal Inter-Section has released a new volume. Inter-Section offers students and PhD candidates the unique chance to publish in a peer-reviewed journal. The new volume focuses on the materials that shape our world.

Exchanges between different cultures and institutions of learning have taken place for centuries, but it was only in the twentieth century that such efforts evolved into formal programs that received focused attention from nation-states, empires and international organizations.

From towering mechanical heroes to city-destroying battles, giant robots have become one of the most iconic images in Japanese animation. On 28 April 2026, Leiden University will host

The starting point of Hermans' research is how both children's physical play and dance improvisation by professionals can be considered somatic practices where sense-making manifests itself in and between bodies, and through movement.

Százhalombatta-Földvar is a Bronze Age fortified tell settlement on the right bank of the river Danube, 30 km south of Budapest in Hungary. It is one of the best preserved temperate climate tells in Europe and well-known for the extraordinarily rich data it produces. Since 2014 Leiden students are welcomed…

Children with a specific phobia are excessively afraid of certain objects, animals or situations. Specific phobias are common in children, but they can make the child’s life at home, school and outside quite difficult. Together with a large international team, we developed the KibA-program to help children…

There are two options to participate in our master's programme: fulltime (1 year) or parttime (2 years).

The starting point of Hermans' research is how both children's physical play and dance improvisation by professionals can be considered somatic practices where sense-making manifests itself in and between bodies, and through movement.

Leiden Law School has moved up three places in the global ranking of law faculties and is now in 21st place.

Commagene in its Local, Regional and Global Hellenistic Context

This research aims to study the practice of cremation in Alexandria and Graeco-Roman Egypt, through the examination of its cinerary urns.

Since 1974, World Environment Day has been celebrated every year on 5 June, engaging governments, businesses and citizens in an effort to address pressing environmental issues.

On 10 May 1940, the Netherlands was taken completely by surprise by the attack of the German army. Wasn’t it? In his dissertation, Wouter Linmans debunks the idea that the Second World War took the Netherlands by surprise. ‘From 1935 onwards, all major political parties wanted to invest in the military.’…

Joris Larik was interviewed by BBC World Service radio on the state of Brexit negotiations, the Irish border issue and ongoing Dutch preparation.

America’s dominance of the world stage is coming to an end. These were the words of Professor Amitav Acharya in his guest lecture in The Hague on 5 February. ‘But the world really won’t be plunged into immediate chaos.’

ENVIRHUS (Environmental and Rural History of Urbanized Societies) organiseert op 17 februari 2023 (14u-17u) de workshop ‘The Natural World‘.

Associate Professor Lettie Dorst has received a Vidi grant to research how machine translation programmes such as Google Translate and ChatGPT translate words and expressions used metaphorically. This still regularly goes wrong, resulting in far too literal, incorrect and sometimes incomprehensible…

Organisation Institute of Biology Leiden